A Red Rose For A Red Ghost
by Jisbonrule
Summary: A fanfic from Patrick Jane's POV, with hints of Jisbon! Red John is at large again, and this time, he may be closer than they think...
1. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer: I do not own the Mentalist, or any of the characters! William Blakes owns the poem The Tiger (that's the poem which Red John quotes in Red Sky in the Morning)**

**The strange choice of title will become clear soon, I promise!**

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Chapter One

Patrick Jane opened his eyes. He was in a dark room, and there seemed to be no window. It was at night, and there was an eerie silence. He glanced around, his eyes starting to adjust. The door was closed and it was clearly locked.

Patrick Jane sat up, and noticed several pieces of furniture, each placed around the room, complimenting the space. There was a single bedside lamp, with its shade tilted at an angle.

He looked down, and noticed that his hands were bound. _Great._ He continued to stare around, everything becoming even clearer. Suddenly, the lamp switched on, causing him to start, and turn around.

The light was shining at the wall, and slowly, a familiar red mark started to appear. It was as if an invisible force was painting it. It started from the top, curving down, creating a full circle. Two curved lines were drawn in the middle of the circle, soon followed by another curved line below them. The blood glistened, and dripped onto the wooden floor.

Patrick Jane remained rooted to the spot. He had seen illusions before, but he had been able to figure them out. This one remained impossible to fathom. He heard breathing, coming from behind him. It was the breath of a man, in his thirties, maybe early forties, and had the presence of a ghost. He must've been light on his feet for Patrick Jane not to notice him.

"_Mr Jane! It has been a long time! My, how time does affect the face! Have you missed me?"_

Jane gulped, but remained calm. He would not show him how he felt, that would make him weak.

"_Mr Jane?"_

Footsteps sounded behind him. Red John's mocking laugh rang out, striking fear deep inside Patrick Jane. A blade whistled through the air and came to rest at Jane's throat. Jane gasped, nervously glancing at the blade that was touching his throat. Red John twitched his wrist slightly, and the knife sliced his throat, only enough to cause him pain, not to fatally injure him.

"_Only joking!"_ the knife was drawn back, away from Jane, "_Why would I want to kill you? After all, it's what you want isn't it? You welcome death. You'd give anything just to escape from the world in which you live. So, I'm not going to do what you wish. I'm going to watch you suffer, making every single day of your miserable life that little bit more unbearable."_

Patrick's blue eyes narrowed. Red John was uncanny at finding weaknesses in people, and using those weaknesses to his advantage. _Kind of like me, _hethought, suddenly very worried at how similar they really were.

"_You are so close to finding me, Mr Jane. Yet so very far. You analyse every little detail, anything that you have. You remember everything that I say. You remember don't you, Mr Jane? Tiger, Tiger, burning bright, in the forests of the night, what immortal hand or eye-"_

"-Could frame thy dreadful symmetry." Jane's lips uttered the words before he realised what he was saying.

"_Yes! And you remember other things don't you? Like, for instance, when you discovered that your wife and child had been murdered. Slaughtered. Maimed. Destroyed. Whatever you want to call it. You remember every little detail. You drove home from work that fateful day. You stopped at a nearby gas station on your way. Maybe, if you hadn't been so careless with your fuel, you would have been able to stop me, and everything would be OK. You pulled up. You got out of the car, leaving the exquisite china doll you had bought for your daughter that very day in the car. How you spoiled that child. You went inside your apartment block; you climbed the stairs, barely glancing at the framed photographs of your perfect family on the wall. You were smiling faintly when you reached the top, obviously thinking of the beautiful wife and child that were inside. But then, you noticed the little message that I had pinned on the door. Can you remember what it said, Mr Jane? I know you can."_

Jane blinked back the tears in his eyes. "Dear Mr Jane, I do not like to be slandered in the media, especially by a dirty money-grabbing fraud. If you were a real psychic instead of a dishonest little worm, you wouldn't need to open the door to know what I've done to-" He swallowed, tears pouring freely down his face, "-Your lovely wife and child."

"_I told you that you would remember. You opened the door, to see my mark on your wall in your wife's blood, and their bodies lying motionless on the floor. Let me take you back to that night, Mr Jane."_

"No..." Jane moaned, slowly losing control of his emotions, "NO!" he screamed, thrashing wildly. "NO, NO, NO!" Patrick Jane had broken down.

"_Mr Jane..."_

"LEAVE ME RED JOHN, BRING THEM BACK!"

"_Hush now. Sleep..." _The blade flashed past Jane's face, slicing his throat once more. _"Sleep..."_

Darkness swept over Patrick Jane, and filled his mind until it was an empty, black space...

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**So... What do you think? Please review if you have an opinion- good or bad! An update will be coming VERY soon (hopefully) lol.**


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter Two**

"Jane? Jane!_ Jane_ _WAKE UP_!"

Teresa Lisbon loomed over the rather disgruntled Patrick Jane.

"Jane, for God's sake! You know that you shouldn't fall asleep at work, and that's why! All you are gonna do is have nightmares and scare the crap out of everyone!"

Jane's eyes snapped open. He was lying face down on the floor, in a pool of blood. Smashed china was scattered everywhere.

"What happened?" He groaned, clutching his aching head.

"You must've fainted. Van Pelt said that she heard a smash and then a thump. So I'm guessing that you must've seen, heard or thought something which made you drop your cup of tea and faint."

Typical Lisbon. Always the agent.

"Holy-" Lisbon clapped a hand to her mouth to muffle the word that followed. "Jane, you're bleeding really badly!"

Jane sat up and looked at his front. He was covered in blood; his blood. There were two slashes across his throat, as if a razor-sharp blade had sliced through his flesh. Almost as if Red John's blade had cut his throat...

Lisbon held up a piece of broken china. "This must've cut you," she stated, very businesslike. "Come on, Jane, let's get you sorted out," she added in a soothing, motherly tone.

Soothing? Motherly? This was very unlike Lisbon. Jane hoisted himself up, with a few grunts and yelps of pain. Lisbon gripped his arm tightly, supporting his weight easily. Jane happily leant on her, nearly toppling her over.

"Watch it!" she exclaimed, not really scolding him, "You weigh a ton, you know!"

Jane was helped into the bullpen, and onto his brown leather couch. He sank in to the worn fabric, his usual sanctuary when the going got tough. He realised that he couldn't possibly wear the blood soaked shirt he had on already.

"Woah, you're gonna need a new shirt, man!" observed Rigsby, wedging the last piece of pizza into his mouth. "I think I've got one somewhere, I'll go and look!" Rigsby got up and starting rootling around.

"Thanks." Jane even managed a smile, though it came out as a sort of pained grimace.

Jane took the opportunity to lie down and contemplate what had happened. _So it was all a dream? But it had seemed so real... And the cuts were just a coincidence; the china must've cut his throat, like Lisbon had said. _He looked at the shard of china that Lisbon had picked up. He gently touched his cuts. His cuts were too deep and thin for a piece of china to make, surely? No, he was probably just imagining things. It was a dream after all...

"Hey Jane?" Rigsby waved a shirt in front of his face. "I got a shirt for you! It's not really a time to be picky, and I know that red probably isn't your first choice in colour, but it's the best I've got."

"No, honestly Rigsby, it'll be fine," Jane reassured him and took the shirt. It was deep red in colour, and probably about three or four sizes too big, but it would do. Red. Blood-red. His mind started to wander.

A knock on the door brought Jane out of his trance. A timid, twitchy looking man poked his head round the door. "Um, Agent Lisbon?"

Lisbon glanced up with a look of contempt that made the man step back.

"Special Agent Hightower requests your presence."

Lisbon's beautiful green eyes that Jane always admired narrowed in confusion. "Can you say that in a language that we understand please?" she barked dryly.

He gulped, looking very similar to Kermit the frog. "Uh, Hightower wants to speak to you about a new Red John case that has just come in."

Lisbon glanced at Jane and bit her lip. Was this a sign that she was sorry that he had brought up Red John? Did this mean that she had heard everything that he had said in his dream?

"Much better. Tell her I'll be there right away...?" she said, giving the man a questioning look.

"I'm Robin, ma'am. Junior Agent Robin Spandex. I send messages for Agent Hightower."

"I just wanted your name not your life story," she spat, looking as if he was a complete waste of her time.

He scurried out of the room. Jane could've sworn he had heard sobbing. If Lisbon had heard, she wasn't showing any sympathy. Of course.

She looked at Jane; her eyes making him feel slightly faint. "What?" she asked, her stoic manner masking her face completely.

"Uh, why did you have to be so impolite, he was only trying to help," he said evenly, "You shouldn't order people around so much. But of course that's what you like doing. You order people around so you can feel dominant and in control, when inside you are actually very insecure and shy." Jane's mentalist tendencies had started to shine through and annoy Lisbon.

"Bite me," she snapped, getting up and going into Hightower's office.

Rigsby and Cho looked at each other and raised their eyebrows. Grace was tapping away at her computer. Jane removed his shirt then sat in silence, thinking of Lisbon's stubborn nature, and how her stubbornness was very similar to his wife's. Rachel had always had a stubborn streak. A stubborn streak that she had passed on to their daughter.

Rigsby was the one to break this much needed silence. "So, a new Red John case, huh?" he said, apparently to himself, as nobody else was listening.

Jane was, but there was no reply to that. He wondered what Red John had done to taunt him this time. "_I'm going to watch you suffer," _he had said, "_making every single day of your miserable life that little bit more unbearable." _Jane shuddered. It was just a dream, he reminded himself.

The door swung open. "Right," Lisbon barked, her eyes flashing around the room. "It's a double homicide, a mother and a daughter." Jane's expression stiffened. "There is no husband involved; he died a few years back. Red John's mark is clearly on the wall, along with a message. The message has not been worked out yet, as the usage of the victim's blood makes it all the more difficult to read. We have been asked to check out the crime scene. There are apparently no witnesses." She cleared her throat.

"Where do you want us, boss?" asked Cho, his expression as unreadable as ever.

"Van Pelt, I want you to stay here and find out as much as you can about the location and access to roads. It is in a remote part of Sacramento, so it would've been difficult get to. The coroner said that they couldn't have been dead for more than an hour and a half, but only a post-mortem examination will tell us exactly." She paused, and waited until Van Pelt nodded, showing that she understood what her purpose was. "Cho and Rigsby, I want you to come with me and question anyone at the scene. Jane, I want you with me, examining the crime scene, if that's OK with you." She gave a pointed look at Jane. He nodded. _This was going to be tough._

"Oh, and one more thing," said Lisbon, as if it was an after thought. "Jane, despite how some may be enjoying the eye-candy, put your shirt on."


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter Three**

The team were all piled into the SUV and were heading back to the CBI, having just examined the latest crime scene. Teresa Lisbon was, as usual, driving, with Jane in the front next to her. Rigsby and Van Pelt were in the back, with Cho in between them to keep the peace.

Rigsby and Van Pelt were no longer involved in an intimate relationship, his hair was less tousled, her perfume was different, Van Pelt no longer wore a necklace underneath her shirt and Rigsby was drinking more alcohol after work. Patrick Jane had noticed these things.

Patrick Jane had also noticed that Teresa Lisbon kept on giving him looks. These looks were unlike any of the usual glares he got from Lisbon. They were almost embarrassed, almost as if she was a blushing schoolgirl. Whenever Jane caught her eye, she glanced away. She had not stopped looking at him like this since she had seen him without his shirt on. _Maybe Teresa Lisbon feels the same way about you as you do for her._ Jane brushed away thought as quickly as it had appeared. That was ridiculous.

"Hey Lisbon," called Rigsby from the back, "Can we stop off at the gas station for more food, I'm starving!"

Lisbon looked at him in her mirror. "Sure, I probably could do with a break anyway."

"Er, Lisbon?" said Rigsby awkwardly, "Can I have some money please?"

"What? No!" Lisbon pulled up at the gas station. "You have money. Now go get the food and we can sit for a bit in the car. Shoo."

Jane froze. _You stopped at a nearby gas station on your way. Maybe, if you hadn't been so careless with your fuel, you would have been able to stop me, and everything would be OK._

"Lisbon?"

"Yeah, Jane?" Lisbon looked over at him. Her feet were on the dashboard, her legs just the right size to reach it. Jane supposed there had to be some advantages of being small.

"I think stopping is a bad idea, maybe we should just head straight back..." Jane's voice tailed off at the look of incredulity that Lisbon gave him.

"Why? We won't be too long. Besides, we are only ten minutes away. It's not like a few minutes is gonna make a difference." She looked the picture of calm as she signalled to Rigsby, who was at the counter, for him to buy a bag of doughnuts because they needed sugar after the long day that they had had. Rigsby seemed to understand.

_That's what you thought the night I murdered your wife and child. Look what happened. Something is going to happen, Patrick Jane, and you are going to be too late again..._

Jane frowned, trying to block out the voice in his head. Lisbon reached out a hand and stroked his forehead. Her hand was soft and cool against his skin, and he couldn't help but succumb to the soothing touch of her hand...

Xxx

"Look, Lisbon, maybe he looks a complete darling when he's asleep, but for God's sake, think of what a pain in the ass he is when he opens that loud mouth of his!"

"Be quiet, Hightower, you'll wake him up!" Lisbon's voice was soft and her hand was once again, stroking his head.

"Alright, brainiac, how do you suppose we get him out of the car, huh? You hadn't thought of that one, had you? We can't just leave him here you know."

Jane could sense the wicked smile that played at her lips. "We could."

It took a few stifled giggles for Jane to realise that they were planning on abandoning him. He opened his eyes, ready to glare at Lisbon.

"Awww, Jane, did you really think that we were gonna leave you?" Rigsby grinned.

"It was Lisbon's idea." Cho stated, almost grinning at Lisbon.

"Thanks Cho," Lisbon said sarcastically, "Jane, trust me, I will never leave you alone." She looked deep into Jane's eyes when she said this, and his heart seemed to do a flip.

Jane quickly recovered and swung himself out of the car. They all walked together back into the CBI, and unsurprisingly, today's Red John case sprung up as a topic of conversation.

"So, what Jane established was that the daughter was already dead when the mother was killed. The autopsy revealed that the daughter had died of bronchopneumonia, a complication of flu, a few hours previously."

"This means," Jane continued for Lisbon as she paused to take a bite out of the doughnut she was holding, "that Red John couldn't have killed her. He only killed the mother. My theory is that the mother, or Julia Lawrence to use her full name, already knew of Red John. Of course, a lot of people have heard of him, but her occupation was a journalist, specialising in crime and serial killers. She researched Red John."

"Let me get this straight," said Lisbon, having just swallowed the last of her doughnut, "Julia Lawrence was holding the dead body of her child, grieving, too wrapped up in her own loss to call 911, and..."

"Red John walks in, introduces himself and asks the woman whether she would like to die."

"But he's Red John, he'll just kill her anyway," piped up Rigsby.

"Exactly, but she doesn't know that," says Jane, "She has a choice in the matter, as far as she is concerned. But she chooses death. She welcomes it."

"But that's insane, who'd choose death?" asked Cho, his voice remaining even.

"Julia Lawrence would, apparently," said Lisbon, raising her eyebrows at Cho.

"Of course it's insane. Grief loosens life's grip on sanity. She wants to die," says Jane, Red John's words haunting him. _You welcome death. You'd give anything just to escape from the world in which you live. _

Jane holds the door open for Lisbon and they all walk in. Jane had to admit, they looked like they meant business. Hightower, her arms folded, lips pulled into a tight line. Cho and Rigsby on either side of her, marching in unison, their difference in height made it no less threatening. Van Pelt, her hands on her hips, her long ponytail swinging rhythmically from side to side. And, of course, Lisbon, her kick-ass expression, and her stiff suit screaming _you better not mess with me_.

They strode into the bullpen, Jane taking his usual position on the couch. Lisbon stood up and looked at everyone.

"Listen up!" she shouted, "I want to tell all of you something. Something personal..."


End file.
